It would be desirable to have an invention which would help prevent health care workers from becoming infected by hepatitis or AIDS or the like from the accidental needle prick of a contaminated needle. It would also be desirable to have an invention which would help reduce the spread of infectious diseases by preventing drug abusers from re-using contaminated needles.
Several guards for needles have been devised which can help prevent accidental needle pricks after the needle has been used, but most devices are relatively complicated, expensive, and require additional action on the part of the operator beyond the standard procedure. (A mechanism must be pushed or turned, etc.) Any guard which operates entirely automatically can still be violated by a drug abuser.
Another approach is to provide convenient means for destroying needles after they are used. U.S. Pat. No. 3,712,302 shows a flexible needle guard for breaking syringe needles and U.S. Pat. No. 3,893,608 shows a syringe with needle destroying means. In U.S. Pat. No. 3,951,146 disposable self-destructible syringes which render themselves unreuseable are disposed. U.S. Pat. No. 4,027,669 shows a destructible Luer lock syringe and a method of destructing same and U.S. Pat. No. 4,332,323 shows a destructing device for injection needles. All of these mechanisms are relatively complex and add substantially to the cost of a needle or syringe and require additional time or energy on the part of the operator. Also, drug abusers can simply choose not to use the destructive mechanisms or find ways to defeat them.